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TMI Blog1978 (4) TMI 226X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... n accepting the form. Against this order of the Commissioner, the assessee went up in appeal before the appellate authority, i.e., the Board of Revenue. The learned Member of the Board of Revenue felt that when the form was produced before the assessment and, apparently, there was a clerical error, the assessment officer should have got it corrected. But it appears that the assessment officer did not notice the defect and, therefore, did not give an opportunity to the assessee to remove the defect. But the defect was noticed when the Commissioner of Sales Tax suo motu initiated proceedings for revision of the assessment. The learned Member of the Board of Revenue, therefore, felt that, under such a situation, the assessee should have been given an opportunity to rectify the mistake as apparently it is a clerical mistake, and remanded the case with a direction that the matter be considered in the light of the observations made by the learned Member. On an application submitted by the Commissioner of Sales Tax the Board has made this reference on the question stated above. 3.. The learned counsel appearing for the department contended that no opportunity for rectification or correc ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... the assessee, to get the benefit given to him by the statute, has to strictly comply with the conditions which entitle him to that benefit. The reasoning, which weighed with the learned Member, Board of Revenue, is the principle of natural justice, which, in our opinion, in the circumstances, would be inapplicable. A declaration form, which leaves the column of date of registration blank and thus is not completely filled in, would not give the requisite information and details to the assessing authority as has been contemplated by the Act and the Rules in that behalf. In view of this, the assessing authority will have no option but to ignore such an incomplete C form. In this view, the three declaration forms in question being incomplete in themselves as they did not mention the date of registration, the assessee was not entitled to have the benefit of section 8(1) of the Central Sales Tax Act. The letters filed in the reassessment proceedings were thus of no avail." 5.. The two cases on which reliance has been placed, i.e., K.M. Chopra Co. v. Additional Commissioner of Sales Tax, M.P.[1967] 19 S.T.C. 46 and Deputy Commissioner (Commercial Taxes), Coimbatore v. Parekutti Hajee ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... hus implicit in sub-section (4) of section 8 that, for claiming the benefit of the rate of tax prescribed by section 8(1), the declaration must be produced before the taxing authority and before the assessment. In the present case, admittedly, the petitioner did not produce before the Sales Tax Officer the declarations which it should have produced for claiming the benefit of the rate of tax laid down in section 8(1) of the Act. The production of the declarations before the Additional Commissioner of Sales Tax was of no avail and the Additional Commissioner was right in not taking any notice of the C form declarations produced before him. If he had given effect to those declarations, he would have acted contrary to the provisions of sub-section (4) of section 8 requiring that the declarations must be furnished before the taxing authority and before the assessment." In that case, the question before their Lordships was a little different. The certificates in form C as required to be produced before the assessing authority were not produced before the assessing authority, as, in this decision, it was observed: "In any case, it cannot be construed as having a mandatory force so as ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X ..... elay, on the view that it was not possible or appropriate to permit production of additional evidence at the stage of revision." In this case, the decision in K.M. Chopra Co. v. Additional Commissioner of Sales Tax, M.P.[1967] 19 S.T.C. 46., was also considered. 8.. In view of these decisions, it could not be disputed that, in the present case, the view taken by the learned Member of the Board of Revenue appears to be correct, especially because the C form was accepted by the assessing authority. If the assessing authority had refused to accept it, then there was no difficulty for the assessee to rectify the defect as he could file the forms during the proceedings of assessment; and, admittedly, the assessing authority did not notice the defect and the form was accepted. But, it was only the Commissioner of Sales Tax who detected the mistake and suo motu instituted proceedings in revision. In Commissioner of Sales Tax, M.P. v. Bombay Textile Stores, Ujjain[1978] 41 S.T.C. 484; 1977 Vikraya Kar Nirnaya (10) 59., the situation was a little different. The question was about additional evidence in the proceedings after the assessment was reopened and it appears that, in that deci ..... X X X X Extracts X X X X X X X X Extracts X X X X
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